This means when I want privacy I retreat back to my room. It's my bedroom, my living room, my space to entertain. It's my home office and my home theater. And sometimes, all I want is another room to go relax in. I am deeply envious of people who have entire homes to decorate. I often feel confined.
I've been forced to challenge how valid my concerns actually are. I'm taking a course on early Christian spiritual practices, which means we learn a lot about early Christian ascetics. These were women and men who embodied simplicity to the extreme. The idea of living in one room would be familiar to them. Many of them chose to live as hermits. They were tucked away in a blank rooms, left to confront God and demons alike. Their living space was their cell.
We today use the word cell to refer to a prison. But for these spiritual seekers, it was a concentrated effort to lead a more Christ-like life. They wanted to empty the world around them to create an interior space where God could come move and speak.
Even though I live in one room, it's not a cell. I clutter it with mementos and dirty clothes. I have music playing and lamps set up everywhere. When I have to think about it, I'm not very good at being alone and spending quiet time with God. I'd rather turn the volume up and ignore the way silence stretches you.
My space is confining because I don't take the time to let go and enjoy, or even acknowledge, the beauty of the simplicity around me. I have a warm bed and plenty of good books. And even if you took those things away, I wonder what I would find if I tried to create more openness, both in my physical space and my interior self.
I could shut down my computer. I could stop frantically bustling about. I could sit and wait quietly for the God who speaks in a still, small voice.
We today use the word cell to refer to a prison. But for these spiritual seekers, it was a concentrated effort to lead a more Christ-like life. They wanted to empty the world around them to create an interior space where God could come move and speak.
Even though I live in one room, it's not a cell. I clutter it with mementos and dirty clothes. I have music playing and lamps set up everywhere. When I have to think about it, I'm not very good at being alone and spending quiet time with God. I'd rather turn the volume up and ignore the way silence stretches you.
My space is confining because I don't take the time to let go and enjoy, or even acknowledge, the beauty of the simplicity around me. I have a warm bed and plenty of good books. And even if you took those things away, I wonder what I would find if I tried to create more openness, both in my physical space and my interior self.
I could shut down my computer. I could stop frantically bustling about. I could sit and wait quietly for the God who speaks in a still, small voice.
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